Hi. My name's Kamen Rider Die, and this is a thread where I'm going to watch Kamen Rider Kabuto for the first time. I'll be talking about my experience with each episode, and hopefully you'll want to talk about your experience with each episode. Let's see how that goes!

This is somewhere between the eighth and eightieth one of these threads that I've done. We have officially reached an amount of these threads such that I no longer feel like digging through the forum to find the links. Trust me, they're there. I started off doing half of Ghost on a lark, and now I've done enough of these that the time spent not working on them is the aberration. It's weird. I'm weird.

I am excited to start Kabuto, though. I know one thing about it, Clock Up. I honestly don't know if that's a big thing or a small thing, though. It's a factoid, maybe? I guess I'll find out. I'll be finding out everything about it, in the next few weeks.

This is... it's a fun point in the process. Specifically I mean writing this post. I do this part a few days (usually) before I start watching the show, so this is like the orchestra tuning up. Flexing those critical-analysis muscles, some. But also just getting used to... I don't know, turning off the tiny part of my brain that acts as a filter. Just, like, typing, and not getting in my own way with it. Having fun with self-expression. It's nice to get back to.

And, since we're getting back to one of these Kamen Rider Die Watches threads, some ground rules and requests, just for clarity's sake.

PLEASE DON'T POST ANY SPOILERS ABOUT KABUTO: Like I said up top, I haven't watched anything from Kabuto. I like being able to watch these shows as cold as possible, so please try not to mention anything from episodes I haven't posted about. If you can, please don't even hint about what's to come, because that gets me expecting things I'd rather be surprised by. Spoiler tags are also a no-go for me, since the notification emails TokuNation sends out don't block a spoiler. Like, I will get an email that says SPOILER here is a big plot point that someone put in a spoiler tag END SPOILER. It's a bummer. It's not meant to be a bummer (it's meant to be the opposite of a bummer!), but it's a bummer. Please, no Kabuto discussion beyond the episodes I've covered.

PLEASE DON'T POST ANY SPOILERS FOR SHOWS I HAVEN'T WATCHED YET: I'll eventually be covering whatever Heisei and Reiwa shows I haven't watched yet, so please try not to mention anything from those shows. Those include Den-O, Kiva, Decade, Zi-O, Zero-One and Saber. If you can just, like, table that discussion for 2021-2022 (I cannot believe I just typed that), you'll be doing me a solid. Thanks in advance!

I MAY SPOIL SHOWS OUTSIDE OF KABUTO: Not maliciously or anything, but if it seems to be a parallel to what's going on in Kabuto? Yeah, sure. Consider this a warning if you haven't watched Kuuga through Hibiki and W through Build.

I DON'T KNOW WHY I WRITE THIS WAY: I tried to frame these threads as accurately as I could in the first paragraph. These are me experiencing Kabuto. I'm not reviewing them, exactly, nor am I recapping them. I just watch one, and then talk about what it was like to watch it. Sometimes they're funny, sometimes they're frustrated, sometimes they're confessional, rarely are they insightful. (Like, two or three episodes each series at most.) Almost everything is a first draft. That is probably not to everyone's taste! If you're already sick of reading this, you are probably not going to love this thread. If this works for you, though, expect more over the next few weeks.

I HONESTLY JUST WANT TO TALK ABOUT KABUTO: All of this is in service of maintaining a discussion. I'm sharing what I get out of these episodes with the hope that you'll feel like sharing what you got out of them. (Also, my brain just needs to process this shit publicly? I don't know why, either.) If you just want to lurk, that's cool. But the absolute best part for me is getting to hear what these shows mean to other people, so I'm grateful to anyone who wants to express themself.

I can never remember if that's everything. I think it is? I've done so many of these and my memory is just nowhere. Feels like everything. Let's say it is, along with the hopefully unnecessary reminder to keep treating everyone as well as you always do on TokuNation. You're great people. Keep it up!

Thank you for sitting through all of that. As a reward, what do you say to an episode of Kamen Rider Kabuto? Let's walk the path of Not Heaven But Not Hell Maybe A Limbo-ish Thing That's Mostly Pleasant!